Zimbabwe Police Raid Annual LGBT Christmas Party Arrest 9

By Melanie Nathan, December 22, 2013.

ZIMYesterday I received the disturbing news from Zimbabwe about a police attack on Zimbabwe’s LGBT group, GALZ, with reports of arrests and injuries.

I was informed by a source close to GALZ leadership that the annual Christmas party was raided by police in Bulawayo. Nine members of the group were taken into custody. It is believed that some were injured during the raid.  This is not the first time the group has been targeted and raided. I have not verified these reports.

For security reasons, the celebration was apparently held at a safe location, and not at the GALZ offices. It seems that security was breached and 9 members of the group and/or guests were taken into police custody.

There is no clear law in Zimbabwe that could justify such a raid and the resulting detentions. It has been clear for some years that Zimbabwe authorities are intent on continuing to harass local human rights defenders, amidst the constant anti-gay rhetoric expressed by Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe.

We await further confirmation, more information and updates. The GALZ website has no report, the Twitter and Facebook pages are silent. We are deeply concerned.

GALZ was formed in 1989 to provide gay men and lesbians in Zimbabwe with a network to facilitate communication within the gay community. By default the network also provided a space for bisexuals and other alternative people who sought more broad-minded company. Primarily concerned with providing the community with social events, the organization kept a low profile at its onset. However, with the growing awareness of the needs of the gay community as a whole within the country, GALZ initiated a program of outreach which inevitably led to the organization’s “outing”. Presently GALZ’ aim is to network broadly with other human rights organizations, the womens’ movement, AIDS initiatives and regional associates. The objective is to increase awareness of gay rights in as broad a forum as possible thereby integrating these rights with the other basic human rights for which civil society is currently battling.

UPDATED: I have received confirmation from a second close source that the raid di take place and arrests were made.

UPDATED; Of the 9 detained. 5 were charged with indecent behavior, and fines were paid where upon they were released. Often in cases such as this detained person would rather pay admissions than subject themselves to lengthy detentions pending bail and trials.  I am informed this was indeed the case here. The human rights defenders involved are reporting that they remain in fear of further charges related to the current raid.

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

4 Comments on “Zimbabwe Police Raid Annual LGBT Christmas Party Arrest 9”

  1. Derek Williams December 22, 2013 at 6:35 AM #

    LGBT Africa is imploding under pressure from religious evangelicals whose hateful rhetoric is becoming less tasteful to the West by the day. African countries suffer other historical Western sociological, economic and commercial exploitations, and corruption has reached such levels that the whole sorry mess is likely to degenerate indefinitely without international diplomatic intervention, ideally through the United Nations.

    Local groups need to get ready for when help comes.

    http://nehandaradio.com/2013/12/21/zimbabwe-ranked-third-most-corrupt-country-in-africa/

  2. Dr. Rex December 22, 2013 at 6:41 AM #

    Reblogged this on It Is What It Is and commented:
    SMH ….. homophobia, if not there or anywhere, will quickly spread!!

  3. jerbearinsantafe December 22, 2013 at 8:55 AM #

    Reblogged this on JerBear's Queer World News, Views & More From The City Different – Santa Fe, NM and commented:
    It is so sad and infuriating at the same time to see the extreme hardship LGBT citizens of so many countries live under.

  4. Emilio Pasquale December 22, 2013 at 9:27 AM #

    It is hard to “Like” a post with such disturbing news.

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out / Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out / Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out / Change )

Google+ photo

You are commenting using your Google+ account. Log Out / Change )

Connecting to %s

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 441 other followers

Build a website with WordPress.com
%d bloggers like this: